Man suspected of killing his grandfather appears in court

The Willits man accused of torturing and killing his grandfather was back in Mendocino County Superior Court Friday morning for a pretrial conference, and is scheduled for trial in February.

Kenneth Wilkinson, 23, could face life in prison without parole if he is convicted of killing his 84-year-old grandfather, Richard Mel Wilkinson, and a special circumstance that he tortured the elder Wilkinson by dragging him behind a pickup truck for nearly six miles on the night of March 17, according to the Mendocino County District Attorney's Office.

Wilkinson would be automatically eligible for the life-without-parole sentence if the special circumstance of torture is found true, the District Attorney's Office stated previously.

Wilkinson's attorney, Mendocino County Deputy Public Defender Farris C. Purviance III, said at a June court appearance that the case required extensive preparation and asked for a February trial. Prosecutor Heidi Larson of the Mendocino County District Attorney's Office and Judge John Behnke said that was too long to extend a trial date, and Wilkinson was scheduled at that time to go to trial Nov. 5.

Behnke said he would need good cause to extend the date further. Purviance had said previously that the question of how and when the elder Wilkinson died would be an issue in court.

Early results from a March autopsy show that the 84-year-old man died of "multiple blunt force trauma," pending toxicology analysis, according to the Mendocino County Sheriff/Coroner's Office.

Authorities were called just after 11 p.m. the night of the incident to an East Hill Road home after family members reported that some kind of assault had taken place and that the elder Wilkinson was missing.

Deputies searched the area and found the elder Wilkinson dead, apparently dumped down a steep, brushy hillside off of the winding, dirt-and-rock Mariposa Creek Road.

Wilkinson is also scheduled to appear in court for another pretrial conference Jan. 11.

Tiffany Revelle can be reached at udjtr@pacific.net, on Twitter @TiffanyRevelle or at 468-3523.